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19 Dec 2002 : Column 1090—continued
6.7 pm
Mr. Barry Gardiner (Brent, North): Nobody knows better than you and the other occupants of the Chair, Madam Deputy Speaker, the importance of timing. Timing is critical in this House; it is important when somebody makes a killer intervention and in terms of the order in which Members speak. I am conscious, too, that the time that I take to make my remarks is important to a number of Opposition Back Benchers. I therefore promise that I shall try to ensure that the time that I take is commensurate with the importance of the subject matter with which I must deal.
When the Government produce a Green Paper two days before the winter recess, one can tell that the timing is critical—and not by chance. The Green Paper on pensions is about timing because nothing is more important than the time at which we choose to get involved in preparing a pension for our future and for our future well-being in retirement. The savings gap in this country is #27 billion. It has been estimated that every person in this country—pre-retirement—needs to save an extra #1,400 per year to prepare adequately for retirement. The timing issue that I wish to put to the Minister, however, is one that the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions did not answer the other day.
The Secretary of State announced many important things including the review to be conducted by Adair Turner into compulsion. He did not, however, announce the time scale for that review, which is absolutely critical, because we have waited long enough in this House to deal with compulsion once and for all. There cannot be many sensible financial commentators in this country who believe that we can continue with a voluntary system to prepare our population adequately for their old age, and that we can prepare for a decent pension in old age without compulsion. I am not suggesting that work will not be done on the matter or that the report that Adair Turner and the members of his commission will produce will not be valuable. However, the work is urgent and the timing is critical, and I urge the Government to make an announcement as to when it will take place.
The fact that a Green Paper is published two days before the Christmas recess means that it will not be given the full blazon of publicity by the Government, but the fact that the Cabinet Office's XGame Plan:
A Strategy for Delivering Government Sport and Physical Activity Objectives" has been published on the final day before the recess—19 December—is a clear sign of contempt for the document. The document relates to some of the most important and fundamental issues facing all Departments, not just the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. For it to have been published today and for it not to have reached the Table Office until just before 1 o'clock so that hon. Members did not even have the chance to read it properly before this debate is a great pity.Fortunately, I have spent many hours waiting to contribute to the debate, and I have had the chance to peruse the document with some care. I shall therefore consider some of the issues that it raises. My first point relates to the elements that it has failed to address altogether. We will not have the fundamental change in participation in sport and physical activity that the document argues for until we take seriously the issue of making it a statutory obligation upon local authorities to make provision for sport, physical activity and leisure services in the area under their jurisdiction. The fact that that question has been fudged in the document—it is not even mentioned, as far as I can see—means that the document cannot deliver to the time scales that it has set for what it wishes to achieve.
The document also fails to extend the powers of the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport to call in the development or sale of private playing fields. I welcome the moves that the Government took at the beginning of their period of office. Before then, playing fields were being sold off at the rate of 40 a month. The figure has now fallen to two a month, and I welcome that. It is a tremendous decrease, and I know that even those two a month are examined extremely carefully, but the Secretary of State should have been given increased powers to call in the development or sale of private playing fields.
From what I can tell in the time that I have had to peruse the document, it also fails to use the tax system to incentivise people to invest in their health. Small and medium-sized businesses should be able to provide their employees with tax-free gym membership. VAT on personal fitness equipment could also be reduced, as a way of incentivising individuals and businesses to get people engaged in physical activity.
Timing is critical. When a Department produces a 223-page document in which the targets it sets for achieving the goals is 2020—in 18 years' time—and it does not specify the individual medium-term targets on the way to that goal, that is another clear sign that it does not expect to be held to account for what it says it wishes to deliver. That is a great pity. What the document wants to deliver is commendable. It sets out a participation target among the population of 70 per cent., but that is by 2020. It is vital that we have key stages along that route to define exactly what medium-level physical activity and extensive physical activity constitute so that we know what the Government are trying to achieve at each stage and how they measure up against delivery.
If timing is important, then so is structure. One of the most important and radical things that the document does is to look seriously at the delivery mechanism of the Government and their capability to deliver what they want to achieve within the current structure. It is not
possible within a departmental system of government to deliver many of the policies that we wish to achieve. That is particularly the case in sport. Sport does not just have an impact on the Department for Culture, Media and Sport; many of the most profound impacts of participating in sport come under the mantle of the Department of Health. The National Audit Office has shown that the cost of obesity to the country is approximately #2 billion each year, some #0.5 billion of which is a direct cost to the national health service.This country spends #1 a head on sport and physical activity per year. We spend more than #800 a head on our national health service per year. The imbalance is blindingly obvious. If we take #10 out of the #800 and add it to the #1, the preventive medical benefits of engaging in sport to combat obesity, coronary heart disease and diabetes are clear. It would save the Government money instead of costing them money. But a departmental system of government cannot deliver that because it has to focus on this year's departmental targets. A Department would have to say, XIf we take this #10 and give it to another Department to achieve its objectives, can we actually show that we are going to match up to the short and medium-term targets that our Department has been set?" Of course the answer would often be no. The same thing happens in the Home Office. It realises the benefits of sport and of engaging young people in physical activity, but it cannot deliver through sport because that is not part of its remit. Home Office targets are not seen to be met by putting money into sport.
The document contains an important initiative. It recommends establishing SPAB, a cross-departmental sport and physical activity board, to pull together out of all the Departments—the Department for Education and Skills, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, the Home Office, the DCMS and the Department of Health—the resources necessary to invest in our sporting infrastructure. So we have the beginnings of lateral thinking about the straitjacket that the Government have got themselves into for years. Through departmental funding and short and medium-term target-setting, we cannot create across Government a body dedicated to delivering many of our policy initiatives. I hope that the document will not have a lifespan of just four hours of parliamentary debate this afternoon. If it is to achieve its goals by 2020, we must wish it much more discussion and a better wind than that.
I have spoken about time. There is perhaps no more moving or eloquent treatise on time than in the Book of Ecclesiastes, where the prophet teaches that there is a time to be born and a time to die. Earlier this week my good friend and constituency neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Brent, East (Mr. Daisley) issued a public statement advising that following recent surgery, doctors had advised him that he had only a short time to live.
Paul has devoted his life to serving the people of Brent. In the council and in Parliament he has constantly battled to improve their lives. Too often in life, we fail to say thank you to people before the time is too late. With characteristic bravery, Paul is publicly facing up to the doctors' diagnosis. We wish them to be wrong. We wish Paul more time, but I could not let this
opportunity pass to let him know and to state publicly the depth of love and respect that the people of our borough of Brent bear him for all that he has given to us.6.21 pm
Mr. Desmond Swayne (New Forest, West): May I tell the hon. Member for Brent, North (Mr. Gardiner) that that sentiment is shared throughout the House, and particularly on the Conservative Benches?
I should like to raise the case of the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs' quinquennial review of Horticulture Research International, its effect on the HRI station at Efford in my constituency and the effect that it would have on jobs. Clearly, the team at Efford impressed those conducting the quinquennial review. The review's conclusions relating to Efford state:
- XEfford has an inspirational site manager who is taking active steps to remove the deficit and seek new income sources within the capability of the site. Although we consider that closure may be the best option financially, we recommend that Efford should receive the opportunity to consult with the local grower industry and scientific community about new income opportunities as an alternative to closure".
I use the word Xcannot" loosely, because clearly Mr. Tucker is doing that, and doing so sufficiently well as to have produced the complimentary reference in the report. However, if Efford is to be given its chance to make itself viable, it needs to develop the business by acquiring an additional manager to manage projects, so that Mr. Tucker can get out there and win the business for Efford. I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to raise with Lord Whitty the possibility of allowing Efford to recruit such a person, notwithstanding the current moratorium that the Department has placed on HRI. I hope that the Minister will be able to meet me, and perhaps Mr. Tucker, to discuss the matter.
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